this post was submitted on 12 Dec 2023
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[–] [email protected] 55 points 11 months ago (4 children)

they literally banned pop-up headlights because of "pedestrian safety". how about having a real driving school system instead of letting people drive if they pass the test after the 1200th time by random chance?

i do agree that a multi-ton stainless steel bomb is dangerous, but cars are inherently dangerous. that's just something that needs to be adressed by proper training and infrastructure that makes collisions less likely.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 11 months ago (3 children)

how about having a real driving school system instead of letting people drive if they pass the test after the 1200th time by random chance?

I would love to make it more difficult for people to get (and keep!) a driver's license, but I think we need to invest more in public transit first. Otherwise people will be stranded and unable to work, go to school, go to the store, etc. So many things require a car, and we need to get rid of that requirement first.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 11 months ago (1 children)

You have a bit of a chicken and egg problem here: Nobody wants to invest in public transport because everybody is driving by car, while nobody wants to use public transport, because it is shit. Increasing the lobby for better public transport by making it harder to drive could be useful there, assuming you make the state take care of the problem cases during the transition (here in Europe some countries cover costs of taxi fare for kids who can't reach school within a reasonable time by public transit, for example)

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

you make it sound like the public transport system runs on donations by civilians. any reasonable politician would funnel some of the tax money into the system.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago

Not when car dealerships pay so much in sales taxes, and they get more money from the feds for highways than they do for trains

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

The DMV is not the public works/transit department

[–] [email protected] 0 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Yup, driving is a privilege, not a right.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago

What does that have to do with my comment?

The DMV, which handles licensing, does not develop public transit

[–] [email protected] -1 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Nah; do it now. There's never going to be enough political will for public transit until people are suffering for the lack of it.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

they literally banned pop-up headlights because of "pedestrian safety".

This is a really cool TIL!!

Thanks for that tidbit

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (2 children)

This seems to be a great time to have that discussion. I think historically in the US, people just couldn’t get around with a car as our mass transit has been historically terrible but things are improving with ride share now (not nearly as good but better than nothing). Now that there are actually real alternatives to driving, we should be actively increasing the threshold to obtain a drivers license. I mean, we won’t, but we should.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 11 months ago (1 children)

our mass transit has been historically terrible

It wasn't always terrible, it was gutted and attacked by auto-makers to pave way for the car.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I forgot about that and yeah I remember reading about how car companies bought out trolly lines just to close them and force people into cars. So I shall amend my statement to our mass transit has been terrible across the past few decades.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

General Motors is the guilty party.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 11 months ago

Uber is NOT an acceptable replacement for public transport and acting like it is, is foolish. A public transit system seeks to move people around, and make enough money to keep themselves alive. A rideshare app only seeks profit, and will move people around as a means to that end. They are diametrically opposed. Further privatizing things in America that should be public utilities is a very bad, no good, awful idea.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

Driving ability comes second behind vehicle design and systemic car dependency.